


Little Kisses

by DARWIN51



Category: Ghostbusters (2016)
Genre: F/F, First Date, Fluff, Holtzbert - Freeform, Some angst, might still become one later, was gonna be a smut
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-09-13
Updated: 2018-09-13
Packaged: 2019-07-11 18:35:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,659
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15978071
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DARWIN51/pseuds/DARWIN51
Summary: Erin finally asks Holtz on a date. //read first chapter note :)





	Little Kisses

**Author's Note:**

> This was originally gonna be my first attempt at writing smut, but I wrote 6k words and chickened out after they took their shirts off and then let the story sit for a few months. Anyway we'll see about the smut and a rating change for chapter 2. I'll try.

The Ghostbusters had been at it for over 3 years. With a strong love for the paranormal and a close friendship, they’d become minor New York celebrities and had even begun training others for more outposts around the world.

For Abby and Patty, that was 3 years of witnessing ridiculous near-misses for the other two. Whenever Erin was available, Holtz had a girlfriend, and whenever Holtz was single, Erin had a boyfriend. It was to the point of absurdity.

It’s not that Abby and Patty had some weird desire to see their friends get together, but the attraction between the two was undeniable. The concept of “Holtzbert” even had a minor fanbase among the Ghostbusters supporters.

The Holtzbert fanbase took a hard hit last year during an open press panel, when Erin was asked about her boyfriend, and she accidentally ended up hinting that she was actually experimenting, so “maybe not a _boy_ friend, per se”. The fans were thrilled to hear this, with many “ooooooh”s across the audience, and all eyes turned to Holtzmann. As it turns out, Holtz hadn’t even known this, and was internally upset to learn that Erin was seeing women but still showed no interest in her. This manifested itself as tears welling up in Holtz’s eyes right there on stage, and she might’ve recovered from that if not for the pure embarrassment of everything, which drew even more tears and sent her running off stage a few minutes later. As Patty put it later on Twitter, Holtzy isn’t really designed to handle being put in the spotlight, and so much attention drawn her way when she wasn’t expecting it caused her to have a “minor anxiety event”.

But Holtz knew it was about Erin. Abby knew it was about Erin, Patty knew it was about Erin, and none of that went over Erin’s head either.

Erin never held it against her, but Holtz never gave herself the chance to explain. She just avoided the topic and wallowed in her embarrassment for a few weeks.

Patty always liked to tease that since they didn’t know much about Holtz’s family or history, she was likely an extraterrestrial. Holtz always just smiled and left it at that. But in some quieter, usually drunk moments, more than once Patty has taken a prolonged look at Holtzmann and said, “You got something dark, don’t you?”

Recently, something from her past that was bound to catch up with her finally did, and she shared a little of her history with the other three so they would understand that she needed to do what she needed to do.

It blew over eventually, and it didn’t change the girls’ perspective of Holtz, but they did gain a deeper understanding of why she is how she is. Sort of.

Maybe that’s what changed things for Erin. Seeing Holtz in a new way. Holtz was not good at showing vulnerabilities, but when she did it was profound.

By the end of the summer, everything Holtz had been dealing with was well cleared up. A high volume of busts on a particularly hot day called for the girls’ frequent takeout-and-drinks-on-the-roof dinner. It was undoubtedly convenient, though completely coincidental, that Holtz and Erin were the last ones left cleaning up on the roof when the sun was just preparing to settle below the horizon. Holtz had moved to the edge of the roof wall to look over the city.

“Nice view.” Erin commented (albeit a little sarcastic – they weren’t exactly in the best neighborhood nor very far off the street), walking up next to Holtz and leaning on the wall to look with her.

“Probably won’t be a great view until we’ve got at least fifty stories.” Holtz said, looking up at the much taller buildings around them.

“A fifty story headquarters?”

“Forty-nine of them for my labs, of course.”

Erin laughed. “That’s a long pole.”

Holtz thought. “Maybe we’ll get a bouncy slide. Like on airplanes.”

They listened to the sounds of the city for a few minutes. (that sounds poetic—it’s not, if you’ve ever lived in Manhattan.)

Erin had been giving serious thought to asking Holtz on a date lately, and it definitely wasn’t out of the question. Every day she seemed to like Holtz more and more. Everything the younger woman did caught and held her attention. It had always been that way to some degree. There was something magical, or at the very least, not easily explained by science.

“Hey, Holtz?”

“Yah.” Holtzmann was looking across the river, her tinted glasses resting over her eyes, the same color as the sunset.

“Can I… take you out to dinner sometime?”

Holtz absorbed the question for a moment, then cocked her head. “Like… the four of—“

“Like, the two of us. I don’t know. I’m bad at… asking people…out.”

Holtz’s eyebrows went up. “Out?”

“Wh—why, you’re not seeing anyone are you?” Erin felt embarrassment flood in.

“No no!” Holtz said quickly. “I’m not. Totally free. When?”

“Tomorrow?”

“…Yeah!” Holtz grinned.

“Okay. Great. I’ll uh, see you then. Well I’ll also see you before that—“

“Looking forward to it.” Holtz said, helpfully leading Erin away from another awkward word trap.

Which Erin was glad for. She winds up in those way too much.

~//~

It wasn’t an incredibly fancy expensive restaurant, but it wasn’t exactly on the low end of fine dining either. When Erin let Holtz pick the place, she truthfully thought it was going to be some kind of obscure hidden-gem burger joint or something. The last time Holtz had picked the restaurant for the four of them, it was a tucked-away joint with little rainbow flags in the doorway and the bartender greeted her by name. Erin was picturing something like that.

This place had a full ivy archway around the entry, with string lights inside and out. The interior resembled roman architecture with pillars and such. Erin was glad she had gone with a blouse that could be interpreted as “fancy” but also wouldn’t look out of place in a Five Guys.

Holtz, however, wore a slim feminine suit, blazer open, white shirt tucked, and a small striped ascot to complete the look.

Shit like this is why Erin started experimenting with girls. It was _hot_ as fuck.

Holtz had also given her a single purple flower, which she had clearly cut from a garden that didn’t belong to her, but it looked nice, as if she’d gone to the Upper East side to get it. It’s the thought that counts.

“Holtz, this place is beautiful.” Erin said as their waiter left with their drink orders. Their booth in the back corner near the patio doors clearly had to have been reserved, for such an ideal location. Private, but not secluded, and overlooking the rooftop string lights outside.

“Why thank you, I designed the pieces myself.” She replied, pointing to a classic and recognizable Roman sculpture.

Erin gave a small laugh, before they heard an artificial camera flash sound off, and turned to see a man quickly lowering his phone and furiously thumbing the volume button, cursing. Erin sighed in frustration, slamming a menu upright on the end of their table, which did the very least to block them while shooting daggers at the man.

Holtz drew her brows together a little and gave Erin a worried glance.

Fortunately, a waiter took notice of the disturbance and within a minute, the man had been moved to a different table somewhere out of sight.

“Sorry. That bothers me so much.” Erin said.

Holtz gave a nod, looking down.

“Holtz… are you okay?” Erin reached halfway across the table instinctively, seeing the younger woman’s hand resting limp on the table, fingers curled a little. She wanted to touch her hand, but didn’t.

“Erin…” Holtz lifted her head and met Erin’s eyes. “Is this a date?”

Erin knew she had been vague yesterday. And with the flower and the suit and the fancy restaurant, she could see where this would be incredibly embarrassing to Holtz if it wasn’t a date. “Yes.” She reassured.

Holtz didn’t look immediately assured.

“Yes, I wanted to take you, Jillian Holtzmann, on a date. I want to get to know you better. One on one. And I like you. Okay?” She grew concerned that Holtz still looked somewhat depressed. “I think you’re really cute.” Erin wasn’t sure how many other ways to say it to put to rest any ambiguity. “Holtz.”

Holtz gave a small noise to signify that she was trying to formulate the right words in her head. “Can I ask, why now?” The look of depression fell away a little, and revealed a childish curiosity.

Erin actually _did_ have an answer to this one. “I like being around you, Holtz. Basically everyone does. I wanted to wait until we were good enough friends that, if a relationship doesn’t work out for whatever reason, we’ll still be friends. You’re an incredible human being, and I want you in my life one way or the other.”

Holtz pieced this together in her head. “Oh. Okay.”

“I’m sorry I didn’t act on it sooner. I didn’t even know I really liked girls until last year. I didn’t mean to leave you out or anything—“

“Erin please don’t talk about that.” Holtz covered her head with her hands, just above her ears. She was referring to the press panel last year.

“I don’t mean about that.”

“It wasn’t…” Holtz took in empty air, “About you. I was just very very embarrassed and not handling things well that day. I’m sorry.”

Erin sat back a little. “Oh, Holtz. You don’t have to apologize. I shouldn’t have brought up—“

“We’re not talking about this.” Holtz squeezed her hair a little, and Erin could really tell how much this was distressing the other woman.

“Sorry.” Erin waited a few tense seconds for Holtz to finish feeling whatever she was feeling, and then she knew things would be back to normal.

This is part of the reason Erin’s glad she waited to ask Holtz out. If this had happened on a first date when she didn’t know Holtzmann well, this behavior might’ve scared her. But now she knows Holtz just has a very different way of processing and expressing emotions. Whatever that way was, it worked for her. Erin waited for it to pass, as she knew it would.

After a minute, Holtz lifted her head again. “Sorry.” A heavy dose of shame.

“It’s okay.” Softness.

“S’cuse me.” Holtz slid out of the booth and scurried toward the bathroom.

Their drinks were brought over and Erin requested another minute to decide on what they were ordering.

Holtz returned with the confident swagger she’d entered the restaurant with, smiling at Erin.

Erin smiled back. “You look beautiful tonight, by the way.”

Holtz actually blushed. It didn’t happen often. She bounced back into the booth and leaned casually into the corner where the booth met the wall. She resisted kicking a foot up onto the booth seat. “Tell me about Erin Gilbert.” She said with a little flip of her hair. “Something I don’t already know.”

Erin relaxed. This is the Holtz she’s used to, and although Dark Holtz intrigues her, she’d rather see her friend happy. “I… used to figure skate.”

“ _Re_ ally?” Holtz rested her elbow on the table and flipped a hand. “Tell me more.”

“In high school. I did a few competitions. Didn’t win anything.”

“Well they’re not judging the right criteria then. What else?”

Erin smiled. “Well, I did learn something about myself recently. Something… kinda big.”

Holtz dropped a layer of her dramatic flair. Just one layer, though. “Do tell.”

“As I mentioned, I did uh, date a few girls in the past year. Nothing serious.” Erin watched the blonde carefully, making sure she didn’t trigger something again. “And I think… I think I’ll be sticking to it. I mean, I don’t think I’ll go back. I don’t see the appeal anymore. In… men?”

One eyebrow popped up, more discreetly tugging one corner of her mouth with it. “You’re saying you’re full gay.”

Erin hadn’t admitted it out loud yet. “Completely.” She shrugged, with a little laugh. It felt good.

“Completely?”

“Yep.”

“No more men?”

“I’ve been dating for 30 years with no success. I didn’t even realize I’ve been treating it like a household chore. With women, it’s not a chore. It’s an adventure.”

“Whooh,” Holtz breathed, like a doctor giving a prognosis, “I think you’re in deep, Gilbert.”

Erin smiled even wider. “My mom won’t be thrilled.”

“I’ll fight her.”

Erin watched Holtz’s face for a minute. The way she put every facial muscle into the word ‘fight’ to ensure the comedic line landed, her expression coming to rest in a toothy smile. She does this with nearly every sentence, Erin had long since noted. Watching her talk is a performance. She tried to explain why she’d been staring at Holtz. “I like your… the way you—how your facial… expression, uh, you have a nice uh… face. When you make words like that.” Erin blushed deeply, her smile falling, and a touch of self-hatred creeping in for her ability to ruin this good moment by opening her stupid mouth.

Holtz just smiled. “I get that a lot.”

Erin feared her admission to attraction was taken as just a compliment. “I mean, you’re different. In such a good way.”

“I get that a lot too. From doctors, mostly.”

Erin was reminded what Holtz had told them recently about her past. About how she had been (mis)diagnosed at a young age as ‘developmentally disabled’ and then, in care of her father, ignored and abused under the belief that she was ‘retarded’ and wouldn’t know what was happening. Just remembering that someone could do that to a child felt like a gut punch.

“Well, I really like the way you are.” Erin said. “I want to be around you. A lot.”

Cue dysfunctional flirting by dysfunctional people.

“How does it feel to be gay now?” Holtz asked.

Erin laughed a little. “It’s nice. I want a rainbow flag for my bedroom. Just a little one. Maybe for my kitchen. Where do gays get those, do you have a dealer? Can you hook me up?”

Holtz’s grin widened and she rested her chin on her fists. “I can hook you up with one.”

“How much do they go for around here?”

“Free of charge, for you.”

“Really?”

Holtz leaned in and whispered, “I’m a dealer, myself.”

Erin zipped her lips. “I won’t tell.”

Just as they were leaned across the table toward each other, locked in conversation, their waiter stopped at their table. “Ready to order?”

The girls pulled back quickly and gave the man their orders. A grilled chicken salad (with a side of fries) for Erin, and a type of cheesy pasta for Holtz. Fittingly, Holtz had pointed to the fancy menu item and called it “mac and cheese”, and the poor man had to lean over to actually read it.

Once he left, Holtz sat back and regarded Erin with a slightly more serious expression. “You think your mom won’t be okay with you being gay?”

Erin had given it a lot of thought. “No. I don’t think she will.”

A saddened look fell across Holtz’s face.

“She’ll probably say why am I being gay now, why not before?”

“Oh.”

“When did, uh, when did you know you were gay?” Erin asked.  

Holtz gave it thought, then let out a little laugh. “I had a crush, or at least a fascination, with girls on TV for as long as I can remember. Maybe age 4 or 5.”

“Wow.”

“I didn’t know what gay was until I was around 10. Then when I put two and two together, I was probably 12 or 13.”

“When did you come out? If you don’t mind me asking.”

“As soon as I knew, basically.” Holtz swallowed, looking down and tapping her finger on the fork handle. “I didn’t know there was anything wrong with it. Until one of the placement workers told me to stop saying I’m gay. He had me move foster homes because it made people uncomfortable. To be around me, I guess.”

“Oh, Holtz. That’s awful. People were… bullying you?”

It was gradual, but Erin could feel that she had evoked Dark Holtz again from the recesses of the engineer’s mind. The way her chest raised without moving her head and shoulders, and the way her chin stayed pointed at her lap. Her fingers stopped tapping, then started again.

“Forget I asked. I’m sorry, that wasn’t okay for me to ask.” Erin quickly recanted.

“No, it’s—“ Holtz took a breath, just moving air without seeming to process it. “They didn’t hurt me or anything. It was mostly like, excluding and stuff. Treating me like I’m gross. But that’s always happened to me anyways. The one time they were going to hurt me was… actually my first experience with a ghost. Sorta what sparked my interest in the paranormal.”

Erin was definitely intrigued now. “Do you want to…”

“Um, well it was a group home, and a few of the older boys grabbed me one night and brought me out to the barn. They’d uh,” Holtz had started off strong but now she was struggling. “they’d heard that I was gay. And they pinned me face down on the floor and said they were gonna take turns ‘making me straight’. And uh. They stripped all my clothes off,”

Erin saw the faintest bit of redness growing around Holtz’s eyes. Holtz hadn’t made eye contact the entire time. Her hand toyed idly with a salt shaker.

“Before they could touch me, the lead guy was thrown like 10 feet through the air and into the wall. And he landed on a worktable with spikes from horseshoes and stuff. Then his friends were all either hit or thrown until they ran out screaming. I was too terrified to even look up at what was throwing them. And then something uh,” She swallowed, her nose turning hot red and a few tears slipping from her eyes. “some kind of force just wrapped me in warmth and comfort. And held me. And I know it was my mom. Don’t ask me how I know. I just know it.”

Erin was thrown through a loop by the engineer’s admission, by the dizzying spin of emotions that had somehow landed her on some kind of happiness despite the rest of the story. But the last part had Erin in tears too. Due to the recent circumstances, Holtz had disclosed the unjust death of her mother, but did so in the briefest of Holtz ways where she speaks in short sentences and skims over a lot, as she does when emotions are involved. Especially with the unfairness of what had happened, Erin had felt an unexplainable kind of loss, and even though she’d never met Holtz’s mom, this story gave her some unexplainable kind of closure.

“Holtz…” She wanted to dry her tears. She wanted to hold her hand. She wanted to put on a big hoodie and wrap the engineer in her arms.

Instead, the waiter brought their food and Holtz was forced to sit up and smile. Erin realized it was genuine. The story did have a happy ending. Relatively.

_Relatively._

“Sorry.” Holtz grunted, shaking her head.

“No! That’s… I like getting to know you. I like hearing what you have to say.”

“I hope your mom will take it okay.”

Erin knew she wouldn’t.

They carried out casual talk for the rest of the meal, about the Ghostbusters, and TV shows, and fruit cups. Erin couldn’t possibly convince Holtz to split the bill when Holtz insisted on covering it herself, even though Erin was the one who had asked her out.

Holtz walked Erin from the cab to her apartment door, arm in arm. They stopped just outside the door on the third floor.

“So how did you like our first date?” Erin asked. She still had her arm around Holtz’s and had spun her so they were facing each other, their arms still linked between them.

“Loved it.” Holtz breathed.

“How would you feel about a second sometime?”

Holtz focused on a stray piece of hair that had fallen near Erin’s eyes. “I want nothing more in the whole wide world.”

Erin’s face brightened. She knew an answer like that was coming, but she hadn’t expected something so childishly genuine and innocent. “What time works for you?”

“Soon.”

“That works for me too.” Erin let it hang in the air a moment, trying to read the way the silence was shaping the engineer’s face. Wondering if she was thinking the same thing.

When she thought it was okay, Erin leaned in, gently taking Holtz’s soft bottom lip between hers, until she felt Holtz kiss her back. They lingered for a few seconds, lips still together. Erin glanced up without moving and saw Holtz’s eyes closed, her eyelashes fallen to her cheek, barely touching the slight pink blush that was settling there.

They both pulled away slowly. Erin wanted more, she wanted to kiss the blonde’s cheek and neck, but the quiet moment didn’t call for it, and Holtz didn’t make any move towards anything more.

“I’ll see you at work tomorrow.” Holtz said stepping away, and Erin’s body quickly registered the loss of heat.

“See you tomorrow.”

Holtz smiled and walked backwards until she reached the stairs, with the nervous air of a teenager at a school dance. She mimed a little tipping of a hat, and disappeared down the stairs.

Erin unlocked her apartment and shut the door behind her, letting out a small laugh at the absurdity. “That _cannot_ be the same woman who bragged about owning fuzzy handcuffs last week.” Erin speculated aloud, laughing again.

~//~

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Leave a comment please! Is this going well or no?


End file.
